Comment on ‘Regional Headquarters: The spearhead for Asia Pacific marketsʼ, Philippe Lasserre. Long Range Planning, Volume 29, Issue 1, February 1996, Pages 30–37

Firms seeking to develop or enhance their presence in the Asia Pacific region will, at some point, have to address the question of whether or not to set up a regional headquarters (RHQ). The relevance of the regional headquarters issue for companies operating in the Asia Pacific region is heightened by the rapid economic emergence of those countries and the debate over a new regional grouping for the area. This article seeks to contribute to the debate by describing the various roles RHQs can play and assessing their usefulness in achieving corporate ambitions. It is based on empirical data obtained through informal interviews with Western companies, and through a survey conducted by the INSEAD Euro-Asia Centre in the region in 1992.